computer science

Pine64

Pine64 is a computer science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Pine64 rather than just read about it. In short: Pine Store Limited, doing business as Pine64 (styled as PINE64, formerly Pine Microsystems), is a Hong Kong-based organization that designs, manufactures, and sells single-board computers, notebook computers, smartphones, and smartwatches. Its name is inspired by the mathematical constants π and e with a reference to 64-bit computing.

Key takeaways

Pine64 belongs to computer science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Pine64 to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Pine64 from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Pine Store Limited, doing business as Pine64 (styled as PINE64, formerly Pine Microsystems), is a Hong Kong-based organization that designs, manufactures, and sells single-board computers, notebook computers, smartphones, and smartwatches. Its name is inspired by the mathematical constants π and e with a reference to 64-bit computing.

History Pine64 initially operated in Fremont, California, as Pine Microsystems Inc. It was founded by TL Lim, inventor of the PopBox and Popcorn Hour series of digital media players sold under the Syabas and Cloud Media brands. In 2015, Pine Microsystems offered its first product, the Pine A64, a single-board computer designed to compete with the popular Raspberry Pi in power and price. The A64 was first funded through a Kickstarter crowdfunding drive in December 2015 which raised over US$1.7 million. The Kickstarter project was overshadowed by delays and shipping problems. The original Kickstarter page referred to Pine64 Inc. based in Delaware, but all devices for the Kickstarter campaign were manufactured and sold by Pine Microsystems Inc. based in Fremont, California. In January 2020, Pine Microsystems Inc. was dissolved, while Pine Store Limited was incorporated on December 5, 2019, in Hong Kong. As of late 2020, the standard form contract of pine64.com binds all orders to the laws of Malaysia, while the products are shipped from warehouses in Shenzhen, China and Hong Kong.

Devices After the initial Kickstarter orders for the Pine A64 single-board computers, the company went on to make more devices.

Single-board computers

The original Pine A64 boards released in 2016 are powered by the Allwinner A64 system-on-chip. It features a 1.2 GHz quad-core ARM Cortex-A53 64-bit processor, an ARM Mali 400 MP2 graphics processing unit, one HDMI 1.4a port, one MicroSD slot, two USB 2.0 ports and a 100 Megabit Ethernet port. The A64 board has only 512 megabytes of random-access memory (RAM), the 1 GiB and 2 GiB versions are labeled "Pine A64+". While the 512 MiB model only works with Arch Linux and Debian Linux distributions, such as Armbian or DietPi, the A64+ with more memory can also run other operating systems including Android, Remix OS, Windows 10, FreeBSD, and Ubuntu. Optional eMMC storage modules can be plugged into special headers on the board. A compute module named SoPine A64 was introduced in January 2017. It features the same system-on-chip as the Pine A64, but mounted on a DDR3 SODIMM form factor board without the USB, HDMI, and Ethernet connectors. It competes with the Raspberry Pi Compute Modules. Pine64 sells a "Clusterboard" with an inbuilt eight-port Gigabit Ethernet switch, which can be used to build a cluster system out of up to seven SoPine modules. A review by Hackaday noted problems with production quality, software, and user support. In 2017, the firm added a "Long Term Supply" (LTS) version of the Pine A64/A64+ boards, named "Pine A64/A64(+)- LTS". The LTS versions are identical to the A64/A64+, but are guaranteed to be available until the year 2022 at a slightly higher cost. In July 2017, the company added a new line of single-board computers based on Rockchip SoCs. The Rock64 features a Rockchip RK3328 quad-core ARM Cortex-A53 64-bit processor; a Mali-450MP2 GPU able to play 4K resolution high-dynamic-range video (HDR) videos; one, two, or four gigabytes of RAM; two USB 2.0 and one USB 3.0 ports; one HDMI 2.0 port; a Gigabit Ethernet port; a microSD slot and several other peripheral ports. Its larger brother, the RockPro64, is based on a Rockchip RK3399 hexa-core (dual ARM Cortex-A72 and quad ARM Cortex A53) 64-bit processor instead. It features a Mali T-860 quad-core GPU and, along with the standard USB, Ethernet, HDMI, and MicroSD ports, also has an Embedded DisplayPort (eDP) interface and an open-ended PCI Express x4 slot. An optional PCI Express to dual SATA-II adapter and an optional Wi-Fi module are offered by Pine64 In 2019, a new Allwinner-based board was added as a direct competitor to the Raspberry Pi 3 Model B+. The Pine H64 is based on the Allwinner H6 quad-core ARM Cortex-A53 64-bit processor. It features a Mali T-722 GPU, two or three gigabytes of RAM, two USB 2.0 and one USB 3.0 ports, one HDMI 2.0 port, onboard 802.11n Wi-Fi, a Gigabit Ethernet port, a microSD slot and several other peripheral ports. The Star64 is Pine64's first RISC-V SBC, based on the StarFive JH7110 SoC, launched in September 2022.

Notebook computers

In November 2016, the Pinebook, a netbook built around an Allwinner A64 SoC with 2 GiB of RAM and a 16 GiB eMMC module, was announced. Pre-release comments in Make wrote that the A64's closest analog was two to three times the A64's price, and that the A64 continued the Raspberry Pi's trend of breaking barriers for engineers. Production started in April 2017. The Pinebook can only be obtained via a build-to-order system, potential buyers have to wait weeks or even months for an order code which then has to be redeemed within 72 hours. The hardware is priced at $99, but due to a $30 shipping fee and country-dependent import duties and taxes, the final price is higher. The Pinebook was notably used by the KDE team to improve Plasma on ARM desktops. In a review of the final hardware by Linux.com, the reviewer was surprised at the ability to have the full, albeit slow, Mate desktop environment at the A64's price. Phoronix's benchmarks indicated similar CPU performance to a Raspberry Pi 3. In July 2019, the company announced the PineBook Pro, a netbook based around the Rockchip RK3399 SoC which is also used in the RockPro64. The pre-order system went live on July 25, 2019. The device was priced at $199, though the final price after shipping and import duties and taxes was higher. On March 15, 2020, it was announced that the PineBook Pro will ship with Arch Linux based Manjaro Linux as the default operating system.

Smartphone

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Pine64

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Pine64 claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In computer science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Pine64 before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Pine64 ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Pine64

In research: Pine64 appears in computer science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Pine64 in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Pine64 is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 2015 establishments in California, Computer companies established in 2015, Computer companies of Hong Kong, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Pine64 outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Pine64 in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Pine64 means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Pine64 out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Pine64 in simple terms?

Why does Pine64 matter?

Because it connects several computer science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Pine64?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Pine64.